Peggy Griffiths, a trim 100, has eaten 30 bars of Dairy Milk a week for 10 years
ONE of my favourite moments in the comedy series Still Game involves a teenage mother asking shopkeeper Navid for a bumper-sized packet of Revels for her toddler's breakfast. "Of course," Navid replies wryly "milk, nuts, oranges, all the food groups
covered there". And yes, I suppose the reason I find it funny is that I suspect there are people who see chocolate, not as an occasional treat, but as an integral part of their daily diet.
But, for all that I know milk chocolate is high in saturated fats, I have always thought of it as a relatively benign food substance, especially when compared to some of the alternatives. When it comes to relieving stress, surely chomping through a box of Roses is better than downing a bottle of gin or ingesting Class A drugs.
Maybe it comes down to selective reading: I once came across an article about the health-enhancing properties of cacao (it contains flavenoids that lower blood pressure and acts as an anti-oxidising agent) and decided to put my faith in it, rather than others which pointed out that most chocolate bars are so heavily processed the flavenoids have been stripped away. So much so that even now, I instinctively steer my children away from Haribos, Fruit Pastilles and Starbursts and towards Chocolate Buttons, Galaxy Bars and Twix.
Imagine how disturbed I was last week, then, to hear Lanarkshire doctor David Walker urging the BMA to back a tax on chocolate on the grounds that it is a "major factor" in problem weight-gain. All this time I had assumed the nation's obesity crisis was caused by a complex web of social and psychological factors, such as deprivation and depression. But no, according to Dr Walker it can be reduced to a single determinant: chocolate. So was the Airdrie GP in possession of new research which justified singling out this particular indulgence for a levy which has never been applied to chips, burgers or fizzy drinks? Had he been swayed by a report by fiscal experts on the merits of using taxation as a tool for improving the nation's health?
Far from it. Despite speaking as if chocolate's status as a devil food was axiomatic; despite tossing around such claims as "babies and young children are on their way to being addicted to chocolate before they can even walk" as if they were established facts rather than supposition, Dr Walker seems to have been guided not by inside knowledge, but by his own prejudices.
Like most interfering busybodies, he may have been partly influenced by personal experience. Perhaps his surgery is cluttered up with chocolate-eating diabetics, who waste his time with their self-inflicted fatness; perhaps he is a dour Calvinist who just doesn't like to see people enjoying themselves. But whatever his motives, it seems disingenuous to use his professional status to lend credibility to sweeping statements like, "it is not unusual for a person to eat a 225g bag of something like Minstrels while watching a soap opera".
Given that eating chocolate is said to release feel-good endorphins similar to those released during sex, GPs in deprived areas might embrace it as a cheap alternative to anti-depressants. But even were we to accept Dr Walker's premise that Scotland's obesity problem can be laid at its door, where's the proof taxing it would curtail people's consumption?
How do we know for sure they wouldn't just cut other food items, like fruit and vegetables, from their weekly shopping to compensate for the price rise? It must be because previous attempts to tackle over-consumption through excise duty have been so successful; the way putting a tax on alcohol has stopped binge drinking in its tracks, for example.
It's not that I don't understand where Dr Walker's coming from. It must be frustrating to see obesity rates soar and to know that a few simple dietary changes would radically improve your patients' well-being. But where he loses me is in his insistence that chocolate-lovers should be asked to shoulder more financial responsibility for their bad eating habits than those whose guilty pleasure is a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken of a Friday night. And in his failure to recognise that good diet, like most things in life is a question of balance.
There are no intrinsically bad foods, just ones eaten to excess. Sensible chocolate-eaters shouldn't be punished for the poor eating habits of others. And reckless ones probably have enough problems on their plate without having to shell out more for the one thing that brings them comfort.
One of the most offensive things about Dr Walker's call is that – like so many crackdowns on poor nutrition – it's aimed at the kind of people more likely to eat a Snickers bar in a bus shelter than dine out at the Fat Duck. Last week a survey showed how a single portion from many of the recipes in popular chefs' cook books contained more than the daily recommended amount of saturated fat. Personally I don't think that matters unduly. These recipes – like chocolate – are not supposed to be consumed daily and can clearly be counter-balanced. But it does irk me that eating Jean-Christophe Novelli's honey roast pumpkin soup should be perceived as an indicator of good taste, while eating chocolate is seen as a wilful act of self-destruction.
Thankfully, Dr Walker's proposal was narrowly rejected by the BMA. In the meantime, I've been indulging in a bit more selective reading. Rather than dwell on the GP's bleak prognosis for chocolate-lovers, I have chosen to meditate on the good fortunes of Peggy Griffiths – a trim 100-year-old who has eaten 30 bars of Cadbury's Dairy Milk a week for 10 years. If that isn't proof positive of chocolate's life-enhancing qualities, then what is?
